Hourglass
by Silenced Cry
Summary: Time is hours, minutes, seconds. It's what Rikku spent wishing for him.


Disclaimer: FFX-2 belongs to Square-Enix

a/n: Just something I wrote when I was miserable (I think that's warning enough).

**Hourglass**

-●-

Rikku could remember everything.

She remembers sand first, because it was everywhere. She remembers how the sun battles with everything below it, how it urges and demands as the day passes, and how its touch never quite fades. Even when the moon comes up, that stab of sun, the sting of heat, still remains beneath rivers of desert sand, pressing at the back of her knees and the curve of her back. That's why she always hides from the sun and waits for the rain.

Gippal doesn't like the rain, and he doesn't like her either. At least, that's what he would tell her, and those were the only words they would trade between each other, until they both outgrew saying what they didn't mean, and stuck to saying nothing at all.

Rikku loves the rain even more for that. She loves its misery, she loves the coolness, and it makes her think of how everything fits together before it falls apart.

She remembers how one time, in the rain, Gippal told her how his mother died in an airship wreck. He told her about the glass, and the damage and the rain that caused it all. He glared at the downpour, wishing there was a way to scorn the weather, and finding none, relented, though he was not defeated. She had asked him "why?" with her foolish, young curiosity. It was only thunderstorms that were truly horrible, but not the wetness alone, not the puddles and cooling dampness of the sand. He looked at her sidelong then, and knew that she was too innocent, too happy and would never understand sadness as he did, and he said so too, though she argued he didn't know her at all. Eventually, he did answer her, and she wished he hadn't.

"Because it doesn't let you see", he said, and threw a rock at the ruins.

She should have argued with him, about how the sun just wants to burn, and it doesn't even care, and that he's just like it. She should have told him that the rain does let you see, how it cleanses and accepts, and it's gentle with you sometimes...and that she's just like it. She could have told him, if she was brave, but she's only been taught to be a coward when there's a hero because she could never save herself. She would have to learn.

She doesn't mind learning anyway; it's easy, except of course, when it's not. She likes numbers because they're safe, and even though she doesn't understand them, they don't understand her either. It has to be equal if it's to be fair. But life isn't fair, and that's a lesson she keeps learning.

Despite it all, Rikku is a smart girl -resilient, and vibrant and traitor to no one but herself. She makes friends easily, and always ends up thinking that trust and hope are given freely. She is mostly too innocent, and sometimes too foolish. She knows where her heart is, who she gave it to, and who it was broken by.

Regret is something else that she has grasped -though it was not from books and scrolls that she trusts but neglects, but was studied from the boy whom she mistrusts, and always heeds. Though the staccato of her pulse won't admit it, her mind does. Rikku knows of regret because the first time she saw it was in his eyes, and it was not for her. She remembers how the wind was restless and the night fell onto them as if a curtain had dropped. She remembers how his eyes weren't green, but were the colour of night because it was so consuming. His hand was at her wrist, waiting for something that didn't come and then retreated. "Rikku", he had looked away, but she was looking at him. He had shuffled a bit on his feet and surveyed the emptiness of the desert at night, searching for something unseen. "Are you scared?" he asked. And he wasn't teasing, or being overly serious, just simple and eager. _Scared... _she had thought he was referring to the night, the dark, of unseen danger or foreign land. "No" she had answered, resting her knuckles on her hips, looking out to sand and sky, and for once found it easy to pretend at being the heroine. "Never" she said. And then he kissed her. It would only be years later that she would figure out he had been speaking of himself.

It mattered little that her heart was big and too open, never guarded. It mattered little that he kissed her that one time but never did again. He met a lot of girls, and said he loved them all. He never said it to her, but she didn't care, or at least tried not to, because he didn't know what love was anyway, and maybe when he figured it out, he would tell her even though she already knew what it was. Now she doesn't, or she doesn't want to. She remembers what it is, but she hasn't felt it in so long.

She remembers it in the faces of young girls, hopeful and lost and just a tad confused. She has seen it in young boys, who mistake it for lust, and mean only half of what they say. She remembers Tidus, who was different and meant all of what he said, even if she didn't want to believe it. It was the sun baring down on them, on the skin that was not covered, on the sand beneath them, and the sensitive silence between one who is certain and aware, and one who chooses to be ignorant. She would lash at him when she could, because there was no one else and because Gippal would always spurn her, and also because he would let her. "I don't love him," she would say, "I don't love anyone, not even me." And then he would turn her face to him and laugh at the frustrated tears, teasing gently, "Then who are you crying for?" And because she couldn't answer, because he knew too much and she too little, Rikku would shove his hand away and run past the horizon so that he could suffer and be alone as she was on the burning sand.

Rikku had known happiness as well, though it was never hers. It was for girls who knew how to smile and laugh without meaning to, simply because they could and something joyous could be found in living. It was for boys who knew what they wanted, and got it, sometimes without trying. It wasn't for her, who wanted so much but got so little. She would always be in the habit of drawing things in the sand, sometimes with her finger, other times with a toe. She'd draw flowers (because none grew in the desert), birds (because she only sees vultures) and hearts (because she didn't know what it was like to keep one). When she wanted to let the images last, she would retrace them over and over, especially the heart. Sometimes Gippal would pass by, and he would kick sand as he walked, never smiling gently, "Make another, and let me break it." Sometimes Tidus would pass by, walking carefully, and sitting down beside her. Rikku's eyes would never be on him, only the sand even as she looked at the heart. "You can't have it", she'd say. And Tidus, before leaving, would ask "Why? He doesn't want it." And then he left her alone on the burning sand, and took Yuna's heart instead.

One time, she had heard that an airship had crashed in the desert, somewhere west, and too far for her to walk. Somehow, she made it there, and she saw the ruin. She saw the glass and the damage and the sun. She saw Gippal, in the sand, bleeding with eyes closed. Rikku remembers falling to her knees with the sun hitting her, thinking that there wasn't any rain, there rarely was. And voice failing, she blamed him, "But you could see."

Years later, she wanders through the night, wishing for rain. Now she is older, and maybe wiser, but with a new sense of loss. She knows what it's like to be alone, and expend all of your choices selfishly, simply because she couldn't find the value in anything else. She gathers some sand in her hands, cupping it and letting it fall between the spaces of her fingers. She knows the colour to be one of gold, debased and ancient, but watches transfixed at the way it escapes her. Rikku kneels down to the ground and lets the moon's light chase over her, and remembers that sand is time and all of Bikanel is an hourglass. She lies down and thinks of coldness where there was warmth, and wishes her time was up.

-●-

a/n: Sometimes, it's the mistakes that you make that lead to sadness. It can't always be the fault of another.


End file.
